This article is in continuation ofNanZhou Is A Sixth Level City (Part 1) but while I was writing it, I drifted to read and learn more about China from the Internet. Let me share it all with you

Link to the previous article:- http://creative.sulekha.com/nanzhou-is-a-sixth-level-city-part-1_609451_blog

本文是《南县是六线城市（1）》的续文。撰写此文时，我去网上进一步了解了中国。让我在此文和大家一起分享。

上一篇博文的链接：

Mr. Cheng has sent me some corrections after reading my previous post

As regards the high cost of school fees he says, “Most of the people can’t afford this high fee but the fact is that though 3000~4000 Yuan is not a small amount but because of the one-child policy most families can afford the high fees even it means the parents have to work harder. The good news is some parts of china high school are free too and at more and more places high school education is becoming free. (Possibly different provinces have different education policies)

He says that the picture that I thought was of a bus stop was indeed of a Notice board. The buses I infer are not allowed inside the premises for the reasons of security. Further impressing upon the measures adopted by the administration to ensure safety of the pupils he says “If you are not a student or an employee of the school, you cannot get in. Every school has a mini police station, and the police guard at the gate.

“Some years ago there were some instances of knife attacks on the children of primary schools. The culprits were disgruntled elements, mentally disturbed or those venting their ire against oppressive, indifferent policies of the government. They were however apprehended and promptly executed. I believe the security cordon around the schools was further strengthened then.”

The incident of trafficking of children and women in China is very high. The stolen children are sold to rich, issueless parents in the country or at remote places. A traditional preference for boys and one child policy have contributed to the rise of child trafficking. The kidnapped women are sold to men in remote areas who are unable to find women to marry because of sex ratio imbalance that has resulted because of one child policy and sex- selective abortions. I have learnt from my Chinese friends that the government has somewhat relaxed one child policy which has been in force for thirty years and has created serious sex ratio imbalances.

Because of this policy the young people have a lot of emotional pressure and guilt for not being able to keep their aging parents with them as it’s hard to think of a household where both sets of in-laws live under the same roof with their children. The apartments in China are essentially designed for single unit family with one child. As such, with one set of parents living with the a couple who have a child too, it becomes a motley crowd. One bathroom is attached with a bed room, while the other one is common. One room meant for the child is smaller in which a double bed cannot fit in. A two bedroom, study cum child room, a drawing cum dining, kitchen and two bathrooms set in a good locality in Shanghai will cost you more than 5000 Yuan ( 1 USD= 6.1 Yuan now) a month, which a normal family cannot afford.

He says- “By one child policy, most of the Indians as far as I know think, means that all Chinese couples can only have one child, which is not true.”

A Han Chinese couple who live in the city can have only one child but if the first child is not healthy (by which I think he means of unsound mind or is handicapped) then they can have a second one.

A Han Chinese couple living in a village can have two children.

A minority community Chinese couples who live in cities can have two children.

A minority community Chinese couples who live in villages can have three children.

A Han-minority nationality Chinese couple can have two children.

So, the Chinese government too has special concessions for the minority communities although they do not have vote seeking agendas before them unlike their Indian counterparts :))

他说，“据我说知，大多数印度人认为计划生育政策意味着所有中国夫妇只能要一个小孩，其实这是不对的。”

城市里的汉族夫妇只能生一个小孩，如果第一胎不健康（也就是说心智不健全或者有生理缺陷），那么可以要第二个。而农村里的汉族夫妇可以生两个孩子。

城市里的少数民族夫妇可以生两个，农村里的少数民族夫妇可以生三个。汉族和少数民族组成的夫妇可以要两个。

也就是说，虽然跟印度同行不一样，他们不必考虑到选票的问题，但是中国政府仍然给少数民族一些特殊待遇 :)

Water:

Mr. Cheng says :- "Nan County has plenty of water. We have many lakes and rivers and we don't have many factories here so the water is not a problem. We use groundwater for drinking. You can see some metal pots (storage tanks) on the roofs. They are the water towers. Western China doesn’t have enough groundwater to use, so there they have to build many cisterns to save the rain water."

"All land in China belongs to the government but every adult can rent a land for which one should be a registered permanent resident and farmer by profession. You have to pay the agriculture taxes and the rent. In January 2006 agriculture tax was abolished. Now the farmers can get subsidy from government. However the income from farming is not high and the youth doesn't like the hard work that farming requires, so the present day children are migrating to the cities in search of better life."

[The plots of lands which these farmers work on are small as I see from the pictures]

In 1958 as a result of “Great Leap Forward” initiated by Mao, land use was put under control of the government with an intention of improving the output. Collectives farming or "Communes" were set up and private food production was banned. Even the food was cooked and served in common canteens.

But Mao was obsessed with industrialization. This led to neglect and inefficiency in the agriculture sector that subsequently resulted in a Great Famine. Private plots were reintroduced in 1962 but still communes remained the dominant units. In 1978 family Production Responsibility System was created and the communes were dismantled.

The responsibility of agriculture production thus reverted back to the individual households. The households are now given the quotas of crop output which they have to provide to the "collective units" in return for the tools, animals, seeds, fertilizers etc. The households get the farmlands from their units on lease but they are free to use it the way they want, long as they meet their assigned quotas.

因此，农业生产的责任又重归家庭。每户家庭必须交公粮，以换取工具、种子、化肥等。家庭承包下农田，他们就可以自由支配，只要满足指定的配额即可。

If such land reforms could be implemented in India then ninety percent of the court cases including land disputes and related murders would get solved and many judges and the lawyers would become jobless. Moreover there would be no instances of the land grabs by the mighty and the influential by force or in quid pro quo deals. While the rich own acres of land in India and enjoy all the tax exemptions and the subsidies extended to the agriculture sectors, the poor can’t even make both ends meet. On top of that their land holdings continue to reduce because of successive divisions among the siblings.